Bright Stars

by Sophie Duffy

  ‘Next Thursday.’

  Thursday.

  Does the anguish of making a choice flash across my face? I hope not. Because in my mind I am quite, quite clear.

  ‘I’m very sorry, Gerard. I won’t be able to come. My wife is having a baby and it’s her ultrasound scan that day, here in Edinburgh. It’s important I go with her.’

  ‘Of course. You must do what you think best.’ He sips his tea, quite the English gent for a Frenchman. ‘It is right for you to concentrate on your future rather than dwell on your past.’ He sighs, puts sugar in his tea, three spoonfuls of it. He is on the verge of saying something, hesitates, then speaks.

  ‘I have a letter from her,’ he says. ‘She knew I was coming here today so she quickly wrote it yesterday. She was adamant you had it.’ He reaches into the breast pocket of his coat, which he is still wearing, pulls out a letter and I remember that other letter, folded over and over and shoved in a granddad cardigan.

  I begin to open it but he says, no, not now, wait till he’s gone. He has something else he must tell me first.

  I arrange my facial features into an appropriate response, hopefully a mixture of anticipation and politeness.

  ‘I am sorry,’ he says.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘I am sorry,’ he repeats. ‘For what both Ptolemy and I did. For our… arrangement. It was very wrong of me to put you through all that. And it was wrong of me to step in and help my son. He learnt nothing.’

  Words I never thought I would hear. Words that are both soothing and disconcerting, for I know I am not without blame. And I know, just as my mother taught me all those years ago, reading me stories as she sat on the wicker chair with her Brooke Bond, me in bed in my tartan pyjamas, I know that the past makes us who we are, but that we must learn the lessons the past tries to teach us. And most of all, we must not be bitter because then we cannot be happy. And happiness is what we must strive for. (You’re welcome, Jeremy.)

  ‘Maybe Tommo – Ptolemy – didn’t learn anything but you must know that I did. I learnt a lot. I learnt so very much.’

  He nods, takes a sip of his tea, and then Myrtle chooses her moment to growl again. He reaches down and strokes her behind the ear. She falls at his feet. His well-shod feet.

  ‘I must go now. I have much to arrange.’

  ‘Are you going back to London?’

  ‘Actually, I am going to Devon. Rebecca is meeting me at Exeter airport.’

  ‘Give her my love,’ I say. ‘My very special love.’

  As I watch him take his leave, I know I have made the right decision. Amanda, the baby, and me. We will be keeping the union and making it stronger. Happiness is there for the offering and I’m going to put a big fat tick in the Yes box.

  I hold the letter tight as I walk up the Royal Mile, comforted by the tartan tat and the sound of skirling bagpipes, the Christmas lights and the rush of people. I stand near the Heart of Midlothian * and I open it. A man comes by and spits on the heart, so I move away to a safer distance, perch at the foot of the towering statue of the Duke of Buccleuch.

  Totnes, Monday 16th December

  Dear Cameron

  Knowing that Gerard was coming to see you, I wanted to write you a letter. Forgive me if it seems rushed; it is rushed. My thoughts are all over the place so take what you will from this.

  Tommo got worse soon after you left. The X-ray showed us what was wrong. All those years of smoking and angst were bound to take their toll. I wish there had been time to get married – I think you knew I asked him and he said yes – but it wasn’t to be, and really it didn’t matter. The thought was there. The possibility. And I have the twins, my boy and girl, to show that our relationship was worth something. It was worth something, wasn’t it?

  Finally, I want to say sorry for what happened. I should’ve been stronger. I’ll never forgive myself for that. And I know Tommo was sorry too. He might not have said it but I know how heavily that guilt weighed on his shoulders all these years. At least he is clear of that now. And I want you to know that I in no way hold you responsible for his death. He might’ve got cold and wet and bashed about a bit in the park but he had cancer and he was going to die regardless of the pneumonia. I just wish we’d had more time. Then we could’ve got married and tied things up better. But it wasn’t to be.

  So, Cameron Spark, I hope you work things out with Amanda and I wish you happiness in your future and send love from us all.

  Bex xx

  I am not entirely sure how to take this letter. Does she actually hold me to account for Tommo’s early demise? Does it mean the scales have been balanced? Check and mate?

  Either way, I feel the cold rush in from the Forth and I slip like a ghost into St Giles.

  The hush wraps around me like a hug from my Granny Spark, the Viking from the north, the storytelling knitter. She set alight the idea of legends, she sparked my imagination. She encouraged me to peel back the layers, to peek through the gaps. My Granny Brown was all about the history, the facts as she saw it: us Scots against our English oppressors. My own mum was bewitched enough by my father’s Orcadian blood to weave the myths of her country into the cloth of history. And this union, she passed onto me. And I will pass it onto my child. Our child.

  I go up to the Holy Blood Aisle and light a candle, say an awkward, silent prayer for Tommo, that his soul will be set free. That he will not be destined to wander the underground world. While the candle burns, I look around me. All is quiet. I take the letter and I hold it to the flame, watch it catch, and turn from a spark to a beautiful orange the colour of a fox’s brush.

  Unfortunately, being dyspraxic, I am not very adept at fire craft, despite my time doing the Duke of Edinburgh award (it’s a miracle I ever completed that). I don’t really know what to do with a burning letter. Have I learnt nothing from the touching-the-oven incident?

  I let it go and it falls like an incendiary bomb to the floor so I stamp on it as quietly and quickly as I can with my foot, wishing for my old Clarks Commandoes which might not have felled women, but which would not have caught fire like this brogue of mine. I have to take it off and whack the floor with it, beating the flames like a maniac. By now there is a crowd of American tourists standing around. They are all agog, thinking I’m yet another bloke acting out a part. A heretic. A mad monk. A raving Plague victim.

  When the fire is out, thankfully and mercifully, I take a bow. They clap and I hand round my scorched shoe for a collection before making a hasty exit as a guide marches towards me.

  I give the charred shoe and its £11.55 gratuity to a drunk on the Cowgate on my way home. He asks me for my other shoe. So I give it to him and walk the rest of the way home in my socks.

  I probably should’ve waited before burning the letter. I could’ve revived the idea of a bonfire in the back garden, set a match to everything and started over.

  Believe me when I say that burning the letter was not an act of vandalism – it was to do with freeing myself from the past. Jeremy told me about it. You write a letter to someone – usually a dead person who you miss – in my case that would be my mother. (Maybe I will do that yet.) Then when you have written all you want to say, you let that letter go. You can throw it to the wind, you can scatter it across the waves, or you can set fire to it.

  So I set fire to it – not that I’d written the letter; I’d received it. But the sentiment is the same. Letting go. Though I probably shouldn’t have done it in a cathedral, the High Kirk of Scotland no less. But it’s done now. It’s gone.

  I also read somewhere that Native American Indians believe that when you write to a deceased person and then burn the letter they can read it in the smoke and ashes. Most of the ashes of Bex’s letter are stuck to the sole of my brogue, which is now on the foot of a drunk on the Cowgate. But I think I will write my mum a letter, nonetheless, and then she can read it, wherever she might be.

  _________________________

  *I have a finely tuned sense of smell
from working below ground, in the dark, listening out, always on the alert.

  *The Heart stands in the place of the old Tolbooth prison. It is meant to be in the exact place of the death cell where convicts awaited the gallows. Some people spit on it – for contempt, for good luck, tradition.

  House

  My feet are stone cold and filthy wet by the time I reach home. I stand on the doorstep, shivering, peeling off my socks and put them straight into the bin before letting myself in. The house is deathly quiet. No Barbara, no Myrtle. Dad must be next door or walking the dog. But there’s a light on in the kitchen.

  Fight or flight? Jeremy asks me.

  It’s a no-brainer. I pick up an umbrella from the stand in the hallway – it doesn’t matter that it is flowery and pink – and I creep in my bare feet towards the light in the kitchen. I am all ready to pounce like a ninja with a brolly when I see that it is Andy, sleeves rolled up, lying on his back under the sink. Fixing the dodgy tap.

  ‘Andy?’

  He fair jumps out of his skin, bashing his head and swearing like the docker he could’ve been if we still had docks to speak of.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Thought we’d had a break-in.’

  He wipes his hands on a tea towel and slings it on the draining board.

  ‘Do you need to finish that?’ I point to the cupboard under the sink.

  ‘All done,’ he says and I watch him put back the bleach and Jeyes and Kiwi shoe polish. ‘Another sticking plaster on the wound.’

  ‘The house?’

  ‘Aye, it’s getting tatty again. He needs to sell up.’

  ‘I’ve told him.’

  ‘The only one he’ll listen to is Sheena. He thinks the world of her, you know.’

  ‘I know.’

  Andy stretches up to full height, which is a couple of inches more than me, though he has a much wider body. He has a belly on him. No wife to nag him. No wife to take care of him.

  ‘Cup of tea then?’

  ‘I’d prefer a can,’ he says.

  I go to the fridge. It’s well-stocked, with proper food, vegetables and everything. Sheena is looking after Dad’s heart. She just needs to tackle those lungs now. I take out two cans of Deuchars.

  ‘Slàinte,’ he says.

  ‘Back at you.’

  We clink cans. Brother to brother, oldest to youngest.

  ‘So how you’ve been?’ he asks me. ‘Dad said you’re having trouble at work. And with Amanda.’

  I take a sip and remember why I usually drink wine. ‘I’ve lost my job.’

  ‘What happened?’

  I tell him what happened. He laughs at me. ‘Good on you, Cameron. I’m surprised you didn’t do it sooner.’

  ‘What, break up with Amanda?’

  ‘No, you dobber. Your job. I’m surprised it took you this long to get wound up by those English tourists.’

  Feeling more confident, I tell him about Amanda. And the baby. He goes all soppy, grabs me round the neck and mushes up my hair. ‘Nice one, curly bonce.’ Then he has a think, scratching his head like Stan Laurel. ‘Why the hell are you living here if there’s a bairn on the way?’

  ‘I’m not actually sure.’

  ‘And what are you going to do about work?’

  ‘That’s the other thing,’ I say. And I tell him about Christie’s offer.

  ‘So maybe you’ll be able to buy some shoes.’ He looks at my feet, black and shrivelled. ‘Go and get cleaned up. I’ll make you something to eat.’

  ‘Right, I will. I’ll have a bath.’

  ‘Good idea.’ He finishes his can and picks up mine, which I have left un-drunk on the table.

  ‘And Cameron.’

  ‘What?

  ‘Thank you. For what you did. Back in the day.’

  ‘Forget it, Andy. Really. Forget it. Let’s put it in the past.’

  I leave the room quickly because I don’t know what it is about Andy but he always makes me feel like crying. Like greeting my bloody heart out.

  It’s quite a party by the time I come downstairs, clean, dry, with a fresh pair of woolly socks (me, not the party).

  Not only have Dad and Sheena returned but also my other two brothers, Gavin and Edward, have piled in. Despite us all living in Edinburgh, the four of us boys gathered here around the kitchen table doesn’t happen that often.

  And Myrtle. I can’t forget Myrtle who is sprawled, calm and placid, in Andy’s arms, no electric collar. The dog whisperer.

  ‘I’m glad I’ve got you all here,’ Dad says, firing up some classic Barbara, ‘I know him so well’ (from Chess, the musical by the Abba boys and Tim Rice, helped along by the wee Elaine.) ‘We’ve been away up the town,’ Dad says, breathless and peching so I have to suppress thoughts of Tommo. ‘I bought a ring for Sheena.’ He blushes the colour of a Heart’s shirt. ‘We’re getting hitched.’

  There’s a pause all round. A moment. Then Andy, the oldest, steps in to offer congratulations, says the right thing and the rest of us follow suit. Dad looks relieved, but not as relieved as Sheena.

  ‘I won’t ever try and replace your mum,’ she says. ‘But I do promise to take care of your dad. Starting with the cigarettes. Now, who’s for a whisky?’

  ‘Let me,’ I say. ‘I have some Macallan’s.’ And the surprise that follows, that I, Cameron Spark, should be in possession of a fine single malt, is greater than the surprise over the engagement of two septuagenarians.

  Check and mate.

  Later, when everyone has gone and the house echoes with memories, Dad and I sit in the front room, the fire lit and a cup of tea each with a splash of whisky.

  ‘So, I was thinking of downsizing?’

  ‘That’s great, Dad.’

  ‘It’s getting too big, the stairs are a struggle and Sheena would like a bungalow.’

  ‘It’s a great idea.’

  ‘And, Cameron, I can pay you back the money you gave me.’

  ‘No, Dad. I don’t want the money. It’s English gold.’

  ‘English, Scottish, British, whatever it is, I want you to have it. Please. Sheena has her house to sell too. We don’t need it. You need it though, son. You don’t have a job.’

  ‘There’s something else, Dad. I’ve told Andy. I couldn’t tell you all earlier, all together. I was overwhelmed.’

  ‘What is it? Are you okay?’

  ‘Amanda is pregnant,’ I say, making the words real. ‘And we’re back together.’

  Then I cry, bawling like a bairn myself and my father holds me in his arms, holds me still and close. The stink of fags is pretty overwhelming too, but worth it.

  ‘And there’s something else,’ I say to him, once he has let me go and I can breathe again. He’s dabbing at his own eyes.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I’ve been offered a new job so I don’t need the money.’

  ‘That’s great, son.’ He strikes up another cigarette. Sheena needs to marry him fast and get stuck right into the new regime.

  ‘Where?’ he asks. He shifts in his chair, something ticking over in his brain, like the sunburst clock above the fireplace.

  ‘Canada.’

  ‘Canada?’

  ‘In Ontario. Head of tours at Christie’s winery. A good salary, a car. And houses are cheaper there. I’ll be fine, Dad. We’ll be fine.’

  ‘Christie offered you a job? How come?’

  ‘Part luck, I suppose. The wine estate is expanding. The brand is growing. They’ve had this British launch. But back in Canada she wants to organise the tours better. They don’t really have anyone with experience. Twenty years beneath Edinburgh has taught me all about tours.’

  ‘You won’t go locking anyone in the cellars.’ He chuckles, the comedian.

  ‘Ha ha, Dad. No, I won’t,’ I say and I don’t know if I am flushing from the memory or from the fire’s glow.

  He finishes his fag, aims it with skill into the flames, sits back in his armchair and breathes out a big wheezy sigh.

  ‘You and Sheena mu
st keep the money, Dad. Use it to come out and visit us. It’s only seven hours from Glasgow to Toronto. That’s if you can last that long without a puff.’

  ‘Don’t you worry about me, son. I’ll face my demons the way you’ve faced yours. Well, Sheena will sort it.’ He chuckles again, has a think, scratches his bristly chin. ‘I’ll not visit in the winter if that’s all the same. But I’m chuffed for you, son. I always knew you’d pull through this. I’m proud of you.’

  Be proud of who you are.

  He must see me looking up at the clock because he says: ‘You can have that clock, Cameron. To remind you that it’s your time in the sun.’

  ‘There’ll be a lot of snow too.’

  ‘You have to trudge through the snow to appreciate the sun on your skin. And remember, you’re a long-time deid.’

  ‘Thanks, Dad. Cheery thought.’

  ‘You’re welcome,’ he says.

  Baby

  The visit to the hospital brings me out in a sweat. I keep telling myself it will all be fine, it will all be good. We can put our pasts behind us. The box is opened and scattered to the four winds. To the depths of the sea. To the ends of the earth.

  The sonographer calls us in. I help Amanda onto the bed and she lifts up her top so that the mound made by our baby can be clearly seen.

  After she has had gunk splattered onto her belly, and the bloke has moved the thingy backwards and forwards, after we have seen that there is one tiny heart beating, one bonnie bairn, the right size, a good position and no bagpipe, we say aye, we want to know the gender, we want to hear that we are having a baby girl and I know Bex would say why do you need to know? Why define your baby by its gender before it’s even born? But I ignore her whisperings and I clutch the knowledge of a daughter to me. And I squeeze Amanda’s hand and she squeezes my hand back. And I don’t cry. I smile and I hug her and I smile some more, clinging on tight to this most excellent piece of happiness that I will carry with me always, in my heart, across the ocean and away into the future.

  ‘Let’s call her Annie,’ she says. ‘After your mum.’